Oakland Local wants to be where Oaklanders are -- and when you stroll around town, you'll see that most Oaklanders are on their cell phones. So this month we're introducing a suite of mobile-friendly services designed to work well with most cell phones (not just fancy, pricey smartphones). We'd like you to help spread the word and tell us how to make our mobile offerings most useful to you.

Check out Oakland Local's mobile web site

Just go to OaklandLocal.com from your phone's web browser. From any phone, the mobile-friendly version of our site will load automatically. It's much less fancy than the version of our site that you see on your computer's browser, but that's the point. It's designed to load quickly on any phone, and be readable on even very small screens.

From our mobile home page you can view the current top stories and blog posts, and easily navigate to any of our site's main sections (including our community calendar).

News at a glance. When you click to read any Oakland Local story, just below the headline you'll see "highlights". These are a couple of short bulleted items that explain in a nutshell what the story is about, why it matters, and whether it includes multimedia extras (photo galleries, videos, etc.). This is useful for people who only have a moment to glance at their phones and can't immediately read the full story, or for small screens that require lots of scrolling.

If you prefer to see the full version of our site on your phone, scroll down to the bottom of any page and click "Switch to the full site," and that's what your phone will display from then on (until you switch it back, or clear the cookies on your phone).

TRY IT OUT! Visit our site on your phone, read some stories there, and try sharing a story or two with friends via your phone's text messaging, e-mail, or other communication features.

Then contact Oakland Local Senior Editor Amy Gahran (e-mail amy@oaklandlocal.com, text 510-383-0386, Twitter agahran) to tell us what you thought of your mobile experience:

• Did it work on your phone?
• What did you like, and what needs work?
• What improvements would you suggest?

When you contact us with mobile site feedback, tell us what kind of phone you use (manufacturer and model) so we can troubleshoot problems related to specific kinds of phones.

Also, since social media is one of the most popular things that people across the US do with their cell phones, make sure you join the Oakland Local Facebook fan page (Facebook.com/oaklocal) and follow us on Twitter (@oaklandlocal).

This is a first step. Our "lean mobile" site is the basis of a number of other mobile-friendly efforts we'll be rolling out this month -- including text alerts, mobile polls, and an e-mail newsletter. This is an experiment, and your feedback will help us decide what works.

Why aren't we doing a fancy smartphone app? Because we looked at the numbers concerning how Oaklanders use their cell phones.

According to a market research survey that Oakland Local conducted this past summer that involved detailed questionnaires given in person to 84 residents representing various parts of Oakland:

• About 80% of Oakland cell phone users browse the web from their phones daily or on most days.
• Only about 30% of Oakland cell phone users currently rely primarily on smartphones (like the iPhone, BlackBerry, or Android models) -- which means that most mobile web browsing in this city is happening on less-expensive "feature phones," with slower connections and simple browsers that generally can't display complex web pages well. While smartphones are getting more popular, it'll probably be a few years before they're easily affordable to most people in Oakland -- and we wanted to give you useful mobile news now!
• Over 60% of Oakland's mobile users access e-mail from their phones daily or most days.
• And, of course, nearly all Oakland mobile users send or receive text messages daily or on most days.

Needed: Mobile beta testers. Want to get an Oakland Local t-shirt, gift cards for Peets coffee, invitations to special meetups, and other perks? Join our team of mobile beta testers: people who agree to spend a little time trying out and answering questions about their experience with (and ideas for) our mobile services. E-mail Amy Gahran and she'll get you started. Help us do mobile well: sign up now to be a beta tester.

Oakland Local's mobile enhancements are supported by a Media Greenhouse grant from the Renaissance Journalism Center.

What's next?

Later we'll be expanding our mobile services to support more interaction, include mobile commenting (text and audio), and contributing photos from your phone. We'll also be introducing opt-in text alerts, mobile polling, and e-mail newsletters.

Stay tuned, more news coming soon!